Death in Venice (Luchino Visconti, 1971)

"Death in Venice" came out in the year 1971,  with all the ingredients to be neglected by the general public due to the scarcity of action and dialogue. However, it succeeded in securing its place in the public memory. Luchino Visconti, with his characteristic exquisiteness when it comes to recreate the past, paints a breathtaking picture of Venice at the turn of the century. We discover it through the eyes of an ageing composer, Gustav von Aschenbach, who comes to the city to recover from ill health. He soon becomes obsessed with a guest from the hotel he is staying at, Tadzio, a  teenager from an affluent Polish family who embodies the epitome of beauty. 

"Death in Venice" is a portrait of solitude. The camera follows the wanderings of an old man relentlessly. It is, essentially, a film about decadence and the passing of time. Tadzio not only represents beauty, but also youth. Gustav is seeking for what he lacks. He constantly relives his past, recalling times with his wife and his young daughter who died. These glimpses are elegantly put together with sequences in the beach of the Lido, watching other lives unfold. The film has a captivating atmosphere and, as it takes us through the trap that Venice becomes for the old man, we become increasingly aware of his fragility. 

We are the onlookers of the painful stillness of the composer's routine. He is always an observer, he never partakes in the action but watches from afar. He is an spectator, just like us. A moment that really struck me was when he seems to finally take a gamble and approach Tadzio's family to warn them against the pandemic that silently devastates Venice, a secret kept to maintain the tourists. It feels unreal that he should finally break the invisible wall that isolates him from the world and, indeed, we soon discover it is just his imagination, which has got very far this time, taking us all into his psyche. 

And, eventually, the ending that we have been foreseeing materialises. In the "beginning of the end",  as I would call it, Gustav goes to the haidresser and he "returns to him what merely has been lost", in his own words. He dyes his hair black and uses make-up to rejuvenate the tired man: the haidresser fully conceals his internal struggles, yet fails to save him from a final collapse in the beach, in an impacting close-up where his black dye starts dripping down his face as he dies. A metaphor of an existence based on the soothing melancholy of memories and dreams. 

The music is very evocative, with pieces written by Gustav Mahler, and revisited classics by Beethoven and Modest Mussorgsky, among others. It forms such a perfect blend with the images, that most people I have talked to remember the film mostly because of its score: they cannot think about it without humming its soundtrack. 

The film draws upon the eternal question of Art and its ethics. This is a theme that could be argued to be at the core of filmmaking. However, I would have reconsidered some scenes where the protagonist discusses the essence of music and art creation with a younger musician friend. They took me away from the melancholic atmosphere that makes the film so special, and added a pedantic tone that was, again, slightly disruptive.

Nevertheless, "Death in Venice" is one of those rare films that stay with us over time, and I believe this happens partly due to its exquisite aesthetic, but above all, because it shows huge emotions with an incredible intuition. Viconti's film has caused a lot of debate over his career, labelling the director as decadent himself. But beyond the logical assumption that he was a man who respected and loved the past almost religiously, most recognise him as a poet of the image. Many frames from "Death in Venice" could well be paintings hung in the golden cities of Europe. Moreover, Visconti seemed to have an understanding of human longing that trascends space and time. He was meticulous, and his films are truly a reflection of this character trait that I personally admire in the ever increasing pace of the world we live in. A masterpiece to return to: Visconti's Venice will always welcome you with open arms.  ⧫⧫⧫⧫/⧫⧫⧫⧫⧫